Strong
by Su-Whisterfield
Summary: Strength, it's different things to different people. One is a killing machine, one is a Quiet Councillor, both need strength to do what they do and both are stronger with each other.
1. Chapter 1 Strong

Kurt opens the door to him, stress etching tight lines around his mouth and eyes. He's on The Council, of course he's been briefed.  
No questions, no surprise, he just leads him into the bathroom and sits him on the edge of the bath.  
Logan stays there, meekly, mindlessly, as his friend works his gloves off, they are sticky with half dried blood and other less savoury bodily secretions.  
He'd not bothered cleaning up before the debriefing, he'd gone in and stood before The Captains still dripping with other men's death.  
He stinks of it. This is what he is, a cold hard, merciless end to their enemies.  
No matter the cost to himself.

Kurt washes it all away. Gentle, always gentle. No need to explain or excuse.  
The flannel on each finger, thorough, focussed, easing flakes of dried blood from under fingernails, sponging it out of the hairs on his forearms, across hard metal knuckles.  
Logan looks down at him, soft dark curls, slender, strange hands, crouching before him. His tail curves out, the tip twitches, slightly. Logan knows what he smells like, he smells like death.  
The soft hands urge Logan to stand and undress him without a word, dropping the rendered and ruined costume on the floor, there's not a mark on his flesh. All the abrasions and lacerations gone, all the bullet holes healed, as if by magic. The memory of the pain is still there.

Kurt slips out of his own clothes and leads him under the warm waterfall which makes the shower.

He runs the flannel across Logan's broad back, down his arms, across his chest, working the clots from in his chest hairs, blood and soap pool at his feet, he watches them idly circle the drain and disappear.  
The water feels good, the cloth feels good, the gentle hands feel good, steady, familiar, secure, the sensations cut through the screaming in his mind, they start to break through.

Kurt is working on his legs, there's no rush, no hesitation, no fear of this killing machine before him. He looks up when he reaches Logan's groin, those golden eyes meeting his, he dreams about golden eyes, breath catches as the flannel runs across his balls, his cock twitching. Kurt knows him, knows every inch of him, his soft lips close around him and Logan hardens at the sensation of that beautiful, warm mouth. The darkness recedes, overwritten by the heat of lust. He runs his hands through the soaked curls. He doesn't deserve this, this kindness, this care, this love.

Kurt alway knows, always knows what he needs. When he needs to talk. To listen. Or just to feel, to reconnect with someone, human, something other than death and destruction.

Afterwards, in bed, Kurt curls up on him and cries, letting out his own hurt, anger and pain and Logan holds him, soothes him, strokes his hair, holds him together, so that the next day he can go and sit on The Council and be sure and decisive and strong.  
And Logan can go back to being death and destruction.

It takes different a sort of strength, they couldn't change places, they are what they are, but he knows they are stronger when they have each other to lean on.


	2. Chapter 2 Paper Cuts

Someone, somewhere is flaying Neena alive.  
We don't know who, we don't know where, but the evidence was sewn into the skins of the mercenaries who attacked us today.

Neena. Domino. She's a tough woman, a fighter, a killer. I don't know her very well, wouldn't really call her a close friend, but she's a person, a thinking, feeling person, and she's one of us. I wouldn't want this done to an animal, let alone to her. We have to get her back. The report is brief on details, but high on horror. When I finish it, I'm physically sick, fortunately, there's no one there to see.

Then there's the file from Kitty, Kate, on the Russian refugees. More horror, more pain and anguish, most of these are women and children. Children. Children whose only mistake was to be born with the wrong genes. The hurt presses down on me like a physical thing.

I put the paperwork down, drink some more water to try and wash the taste of bile from my throat.  
Looking out over Krakoa, spread beneath the window, a jewelled patchwork of rainbow lights. Why is it so wrong to want somewhere of our own? Somewhere safe? The images in the files dance before my eyes every time I close my eyes.

There's someone at the door. I really don't want to see anyone.  
But the door opens anyway, because it's him and it knows I won't turn him away.

He's a mess, foul with blood and bodily fluids. He stinks, his eyes are bleak and empty.  
I'm an idiot, upset over reports when he and Kate and Neena are out there spilling blood for our cause.

I lead him through to the bathroom, he's switched off, hiding his mind from the result of his killing. His state sanctioned killing. Sanctioned by people like me. The blood of those mercenaries is on my hands too. And through them, Neena's. There are no innocents here. Apart from the children we are trying to protect.

I clean him off, I've done this before, he trusts me. The smell is vile, I want to gag, I won't gag, my disgust is not with him. I hate what this does to him. What we ask him to do. The price he pays.

But the water is warm and soothing, for both of us. On my knees before him. Good Catholic men do not give their friends blow jobs in the shower. Good Catholic men do not love mass murderers either, but, here we are.

I know what this looks like, I know what I look like, doing this, what others think.  
But this connection, it's real, it's warm, it's healthy, it's good for both of us. I learned a very long time ago not to care what others think of me.

I know I need this as much as he does; he needs the link with something, someone, warm and living. I need. I need. I don't know what I need. But the sweet-salt taste of his cock in my mouth, the smell of him, his heavy, killing hands in my hair, I need this too. For a few minutes the pictures behind my eyes are not of crying, emaciated children or Neena's flayed skin.  
He comes in my mouth and I swallow, it washes away the taste of bile. His hands run through my hair.

"You don't need to..." his voice is horse, but he has it back again.  
I stand up, I'm taller than him. His arms come around me and I lean into his strength; there is nowhere safer on earth. "I know I don't. It's gift, freely given."  
He kisses my forehead. "I don't deserve you."

We help towel each other dry. Of course, it takes much longer to dry my fur than his short, hairy ass. I'm too tired and drained to be aroused; I've been in emergency meetings all day, but the sensation of being rubbed down is soothing, the tension in my own shoulders is easing. Different sort of stress to his.  
He lies on his back, heavy, solid, secure and I get to use him as a pillow.

"Elf? What's up?"  
He won't let me get away with not answering. That's the deal; he comes to me when he feels his connection with his humanity slipping and I go to him when I need someone to lean on. But it's just paperwork. While others die or kill to keep me, and those like me, safe.  
"Neena. The Russian refugees... I can't..." His huge hands stroke my back, soothing.  
"You can, you do. We'll get her home. I promise."

I nod, but the images in the reports still dance behind my eyes. Oh, God. Neena. Before Krakoa, Neena and I were running a workshop together, for mutants, accepting who we are. They're skinning her alive! She's still alive. The horror rises in me, I'm gagging on it, choking, drowning. Dear, sweet, Lord, please, please help her.  
When I start sobbing, he holds me, lets me cry it out. He doesn't shame me for my weakness, just strokes my hair.  
My friend. My best friend. I could not keep doing this without him.

And I have to keep doing this. That's my role now, not going out and saving people or going out and killing people, but having the guts to send others, to send him. And to deal with the paperwork afterwards.

I fall asleep listening to his heartbeat and feeling his hand still stroking my back and he keeps my demons at bay.


	3. Chapter 3 Thoroughbred

I wake from a good night's sleep to a heavy, familiar weight in my arms. That warm body is the reason for the good sleep.

I run my hand down his flank; not heavy enough at the moment, the muscles can't hide the prominent ribs and hip bones. There's not an ounce of spare flesh on him. He's supposed to be at least 160 pounds, I'd prefer 170 or 175, but I'd guess he's currently less than 150.

When he first joined us, he was scrawny as an alley cat that had never had a square meal. He looked sharper, harder, particularly in the face, and always hungry, like a teenager, though he was over twenty. Not his fault, mutant thing; the speedsters and 'porters all run 'hot', their bodies take a lot of energy to keep going.  
He needs at least five thousand calories a day, more if he's working. He knows this, Moira and Chuck have drilled it into him over the years and back at the Mansion, it was easy to keep an eye on him. Here we're too spread out, it's weeks since I've seen him.  
He's got the body of an athlete, an olympic level athlete. Me? I'm an old workhorse, shove anything in me and my body can convert it into fuel, Kurt is a thoroughbred, like those fancy horses you see at the racetrack, his body is a beautiful machine and it functions best with the right diet. He knows this too.  
Oh, he says he's eating, he won't lie and he won't deliberately neglect himself, he is eating, but he's not eating enough of the right stuff, and he's distracted by work and this Council crap. Might have to have a word with Jeannie. And 'Ro. They see more of him these days.

Still beautiful though, still feels good in my arms. I'm glad I was here for him. That he was here for me. I stoke that soft fur, sensation soothes me nearly as much as it soothes him.

Need to check up on Jeannie this morning; Chuck is important to her, yesterday was not a good day, not a pretty sight. She's gonna be upset too.  
Glad she didn't see me in that state after the meeting with the Captains, she knows what I am, she saw me (and Hank, I bet his head's in a bad place too) take down the fuckin' bastard mercs, but I'm glad she didn't see the mess I was in after, she'd seen enough for one day.  
But Kurt just knows, knows how to clean me up, knows how much to talk to me, when to be quiet. An' I didn't know who else would be about, the Summers habitat on the moon is just too crowded with strangers, well, not strangers, but not people I want to be around in such a state. Also it's too far out, too far from living things, Kurt's rooms are full of life, green and growing, they smell warm and living and, well, like him. Funny, 'Ro's always been the green fingered one.

What would I have done if I found her with Scotty? Dunno, but it might not have been pretty. My self control was wafer thin last night, dangerous to be around me.  
What would I have done if I'd turned up here an' my Elf had an orgy goin' on with half a dozen pretty things? Dunno either, but I do know he'd have still been in the bathroom with me, sorting me out. Because. Because that's just us.  
Jeannie has a bee in her bonnet about me not 'owning' her. And I get it. My urge is to fight every man I see for her. She is mine. I have to have her.  
Kurt is my lad, my lovely lad, but I don't 'own' him. No more than I'd own a moonbeam. Or his smile. Doesn't bother me when he's with someone else, just makes me glad he's happy. He deserves it.  
It's like that quick blow job in the shower last night. He didn't have to do that, I was coming back to myself just fine. He has done that, and more, to reach me when I've really lost it, when I've really only been clinging on by my finger nails. I try not to let it get that bad. But he didn't need to last night. He wanted to, like he said, a gift. If he was mine, if I owned him, then he might have felt he _had_ to.  
I need to get in the same headspace with Jeannie. Fuck knows how, though.

I look over his head, across at the huge window, dawn is approaching. I continue to stroke his side with my thumb, he arches his back, he's starting to wake.  
He'll be fine now.

See, I know this man very, very well, sometimes better than he knows himself; he's not just upset for Neena and Chuck and those refugees. He's upset for the mercs who invaded us too; he doesn't just see nameless mooks, ruthless killers, Kurt sees the little boys and girls they were twenty, thirty years ago. He doesn't cry for the bastards they became, but for the lost opportunities they had to be better than that. There are no faceless bad guys to him, they are all people.

He cares too much. But the day he stops caring too much will be a bad day for all of us.  
His compassion is a strength, not a weakness, when he sends soldiers like me out, he's full aware of the cost, to us, to them, in a way that Mags, Apocalypse and the rest aren't, even Chuck. Even Scotty.

He's definitely waking, He's is an early bird, he'll want a work out before breakfast.  
I can help with that.  
I run my hand down his side and move it round to gently take his cock in hand.  
"Mmm..." pleased, drowsy sound. He snuggles into me.  
"That nice?"  
"Mmmmm."  
I slide my hand down his cock, he's uncut, we both are, so I know just how to handle him. He arches into me, I bring my head down and nuzzle into the sensitive join between neck and shoulder. The muscles on his stomach ripple as he responds to what I'm doing. Sensual. I love watching him. His body responds to my familiar touch, he trusts me, we trust each other. He's hard now, thrusting into my fist and I bring him to climax.  
"Ah. Ah! God!"  
"An' good mornin' to you too, Elf." I kiss his neck. There are worse ways to start the day. And worse people to start the day with.


End file.
